The Associated Press

COLUMBUS — The Columbus Dispatch is reporting that a former Ohio State football player is the lawyer who sent e-mails to football coach Jim Tressel last spring telling him that players were selling memorabilia.

The newspaper, citing three unidentified sources, reports Columbus attorney Christopher Cicero sent the e-mails. Cicero lettered in football at Ohio State in 1983, when Tressel was an assistant coach, according to The Columbus Dispatch.

In a statement released Wednesday Cicero says he voluntarily cooperated when an Ohio State attorney asked him to meet with university representatives and the NCAA about e-mails he exchanged with Tressel.

The university on Tuesday suspended Tressel for the first two games of the 2011 season and fined him $250,000 for failing to notify the school about the players’ involvement.